Cornell University researchers and students are collaborating with community members to clarify the role played by the Church of St. James AME Zion in the abolitionist movement in the 1800s.

11-year-old Khalil Hicks (Khalil Hicks) stepped across a 3-foot trench, pointed a trowel at him and his archaeologist colleagues found an unexpected treasure-right in Issa The most important subway station of St. James is near the stone base of Zion Church.

Hicks was on duty that day. At first, he thought that the compacted soil in the sieve tray was nothing more than a stone. "Then I saw a nail coming out," he said. "I lifted it up in the sun and slammed it—a door hinge! Everyone was cheering because I found something very important."

This is the latest discovery from the excavation site. A multidisciplinary team composed of community members and Cornell University faculty has been collaborating to learn more about St. James.

"The church is a treasure trove of history, and we haven't even touched the skin," said Pastor Terence King of St. James.

Pastor Terence King of St. James AME Zion Church in Ithaca said that the excavations of St. James revived interest in the church’s rich abolitionist history.

Built in 1833, this church was almost mistaken for another residence on Cleveland Avenue in the southern neighborhood of Ithaca. But St. James has a series of significant differences.

It is considered the oldest religious building in Ithaca. It is the oldest active AME Zion church in the world, and the sect is known as the "Liberal Church" because of its role in the abolitionist movement. St. James hosted abolitionists, including Frederick Douglass, who spoke there in 1852, and possibly Harriet Tubman, who visited Ithaca several times. ), she has family in the area and is a member of the sect.

But much of the church’s history remains unknown—for example, whether there is any truth to the rumors that it sheltered enslaved freedom seekers in secret hideouts or tunnels.

From September 18 to November 13, the local middle school student team and Cornell University faculty and students dug five trenches on a small lawn next to the church on Saturday. The original pastor used to Stands there. Neighbors often stop to check their progress and even dig something by themselves.

"You can only do this as a team," said Adam T. Smith, Distinguished Professor of Arts and Sciences in Anthropology, School of Arts and Sciences (A&S), who led the Discovery Near East Study (A&S) with Associate Professor Lori Khatchadourian. . "It's not just that we are revealing the history of this community. We are actually building a community."

Brita Lorentzen '06, Ph.D.'15 (left), research assistant and manager of Cornell Annual Ring Laboratory, and Sturt Manning, Distinguished Art and Science Professor of Classical Archaeology in the School of Arts and Sciences, inspecting the AME Zion Bell Tower in St. James Wood Church of Ithaca. 

Write a biography of the building

In the fraternity hall on the first floor of the church, Kachdurian leaned on a white box containing some of the artifacts they had discovered so far: glass bottle fragments, a punched glass hole dating from the 1840s to the 1960s Cup, debris from the heel. A wooden shoe, fragments of a record, fine ceramic tableware and fragments of everyday unglazed pots, iron nails, wire nails, animal bones, bottle caps, bricks, coal. "Even small pieces of pottery can provide information, especially about daily diet and economic issues-what people can get and afford," she said.

For example, in the 19th and early 20th centuries, households generally used cheaper bituminous coal or more expensive anthracite for heating. "We found almost equal amounts of pitch and anthracite, which is a bit surprising," Khatchadourian said.

Every week, she meets with Fred Gleach, senior lecturer and curator of the Anthropology Collection (A&S), and Sherene Baugher, professor of landscape architecture in the School of Agriculture and Life Sciences and North American historical archaeologist, to "read" these artifacts. The objects mainly date back to the late 1800s and 1900s; on the last day of excavation, they found the most exciting discovery: a penny dating back to 1891.

The fact that they have discovered so many artifacts is encouraging. "This is not always the case in archaeology," she said. "Sometimes you dig and find nothing. The artifacts we found tell the continuous history of the church from the 19th century to the present."

Maia Dedrick, a Hirsch postdoctoral researcher at Cornell University's Institute of Archaeology and Materials (left), and Lori Khatchadourian, associate professor of Near East Studies at the College of Arts and Sciences and co-director of the St. James Excavation Project, examine the soil and shake it in a sieve.

Discussions on continuing excavation in the summer of 2022 are ongoing; so many local students have signed up for this year's excavation activities that there is already a waiting list next year.

This project is one of several initiatives of Cornell University's Underground Railway Research Project. It is directed by Professor Gerard Aching of Africa and Romance Studies (A&S) and is partially supported by A&S's Fowkes Family New Frontier Grant.

Preliminary work will begin in the summer of 2020. Larry Brown, professor of geophysics at the School of Engineering, Sidney Kaufman, conducted a ground penetrating radar scan and found obvious anomalies in the church courtyard.

Eight faculty members of the Cornell Institute for Archaeology and Materials (CIAMS) are providing their expertise. Professor of Anthropology Nerissa Russell and Hirsch postdoctoral assistant Maia Dedrick of CIAMs specialize in animal archaeology and paleo-ethnobotany. Other teachers are sharing their knowledge in geophysics, dendrochronology, spatial analysis and North American archeology. "We brought everything Cornell Archaeology has to offer," Khatchadourian said.

On the top floor of the church, Sturt Manning, Distinguished Professor of Art and Science of Classical Archaeology (A&S), and his undergraduates and graduate students climbed the ladder to enter the church tower to collect wood samples. They also explored the basement, where some of the wood was damaged by the fire. "For more than 150 years, this little corner seems to be one of the oldest areas that hasn't really been touched yet," Manning said.

With luck, the sample will show the type of trees, whether they were grown locally or imported, and the year they were harvested. He said that the wood that supports the burning wood can provide the year of the fire. "This is the biography of the building we want to figure out," he said.

Lillie Steen '23, an undergraduate student in archaeology and art history at the College of Arts and Sciences, screened the excavated soil at St. James AME Zion Church in Ithaca. 

Back at the excavation site, Khalil Hicks described the techniques he learned from Cornell archaeologists. "You have to scrape off the top layer—you don't dig—and then you put all the scraped layers in a pile. You scoop it all up and put it in a sieve," he said.

Khalil collects gems and hopes to study archeology or geology at university. "Rocks are my thing," he said.

Khalil's father, John Hicks, said that the excavation provided the homeschooling child with a valuable opportunity to explore his passion. "The biggest change I have seen is his level of patience in accomplishing the goal-setting the goal and having enough patience to deal with it."

Ithaca teachers Dennis Lee '73 and Abbe Lee '73 said that the excavation also expanded students' mastery of mathematics, archaeology and technology, such as ground penetrating radar and drones for surveying and mapping. They helped recruit participants through the Saturday School of Science and Mathematics, a non-profit enrichment program based on STEM, aimed at students of color. Hicks is one of several academies involved. "They were amazed by everything they saw," Denise Lee said. "You can't overstate this level of experiential learning," Abe Lee added. "You can't long for things you haven't touched."

Community members, local students, and Cornell University faculty and students participated in the excavation of St. James AME Zion Church in Ithaca, a unique example of community archaeology.

Aching and King wanted to create a 3D digital model of the underground railway K-12 courses and buildings centered on St. James. They plan to form a focus group for teachers in the summer of 2022 to understand what should be an online "teacher toolbox" for educators across the country.

Academic research is also in progress. Aching is writing a monograph on modern underground railway methods, focusing on his collaboration with St. James. Archaeologists will write dissertations about their findings, the project as an unusual example of community archaeology, and the unique age range of participating students, from middle school students to doctoral students. "This has never been a purely charitable community service," Aching said. "We have all done a lot of challenging and mutually beneficial learning here."

King is a middle school special education teacher. He envisioned an experiential course where students could play treasure hunts in the church and ring the bells on the bell tower because they knew about abolitionists like Douglas and Tubman. Activists. He said that history will jump over the pages of the textbook.

"You don't have to go to Rochester, Buffalo or Auburn to learn about these big names," he said. "You can go directly to Cleveland Avenue and be in it."

On the second floor of the church, stained glass windows bathe the sanctuary in soft sunlight. Church historian Nick Sledziona flipped through a white binder with his thumb, which recorded the history of St. James with a transparent plastic sleeve.

He read a letter to the editor published in Ithaca Magazine in 1889, in which a tanner described an unknown priest of St. James as a "very efficient" conductor on the underground railway. "'Every few days, he would come to my office and say he has one, two, three or four. He would ask me if I would provide something to help them get to North Star," Sledziona wrote, noting "This is the eyewitness testimony of a pastor active in St. James, helping people escape freedom."

Sledziona said that at least two St. James pastors were open to their abolition activities. The most famous Jermaine Loguen (Jermaine Loguen) was born as a slave in Tennessee, escaped freedom, and spent most of his time in Syracuse, his house is the main station of the underground railway. He wrote for "North Star", an abolitionist newspaper published by Douglass, a member of the AME Zion sect.

"Yingshi. If you are going north, James is strategically very close to the exact location of your boat."

Aching said these pastors took huge risks. After 1850, the Fugitive Slave Act made it a punishable crime to assist those seeking freedom. "You will endanger the livelihoods of others. You may be put in jail for six months, which will ruin a family. Otherwise, you will be fined $1,000—about $25,000 today," Aching said. "This is remarkable. This is the federal effort to ensure that slave owners have a chance to regain what they think is their property."

In the oral history of possible hiding places or tunnels, the tendrils of this period of history continue to wrap around St. James.

So far, the Cornell team has not found evidence of hidden space. They said this is not surprising, because the church was originally the most obvious place for the authorities to find freedom seekers.

"In fact, the church and surrounding communities are very close to Cayuga Lake-it's almost as interesting as anything," Manning said. "What you are looking for is a secret way to travel. If you are going north, St. James is strategically very close to the exact location of your boat."

It's more likely to find artifacts made only in the south-such as a button. "We are looking for any signs of material that seemed outdated in Ithaca in the 1840s," Smith said. "These people could have acted secretly and quickly, but what they carry with them shows where they came from."

Even so, the idea of ​​a tunnel still attracts people's imagination, Aching said, perhaps symbolizing the courage and hope people need to escape from slavery.

"You don't know where you will end up. You don't know how you will make a living," he said. "But you have to seize the opportunity."

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